This is a cross-national study of determinants of women's share of the labor force. Previous research suggests that national rates of female share of the labor force are affected by economic development and international trade. Economic development has been linked to increased education opportunities for women, decreased fertility rates and increased gross national product per capita. These effects of economic development were suggested to improve women's economic opportunities. Some studies have focussed on the effects of foreign trade and finance on cross-national variations in female labor force participation rates. World-system researchers have recommended changes in methods and theory that suggest that the determinants of female labor force participation need to be reexamined. By using statistical methods recently introduced to cross-national research, as well as more recent data, I have tested hypotheses suggested by previous research for the decade of the 1980's. Specifically, previous research suggested that economic development increases and international trade generally decreases women's share of the labor force. This period was a tumultuous time in the world-economy. Many countries experienced debt crises and many attempted economic restructuring by focusing on exports of manufactured commodities instead of raw materials and agricultural goods. I have tested for the effects of these changes on changes in women's share of the labor force using data from the 60 countries for which data were available. Lowered fertility rates increased women's share of the labor force in the 1980's, but that was the only modernization indicator that had an effect. The proportion of a country's revenues obtained from exports affected women's share of the labor force, but this effect varied by levels of commodity concentration and exports in manufactured products. As commodity concentration increased, the positive effect of exports became less positive. As manufactured exports became a bigger proportion of all of a countries exports, the positive effect of exports as a source of a country's revenues on women's share of the labor force became more positive. Debt servicing and debt restructuring was not found to have an effect on women's share of the labor force in the 1980's.

Culture, structure, and means of resource mobilization are examined in the context of the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra in Ceara, Brazil. Specifically, this study reviews the structure of the movement, how it creates a rural, landless worker culture, and its mobilization techniques. Using various theoretical paradigms, the concept of populism, which sees the use of culture as a means to build power to gain recognition, legitimacy, and support, is adapted to this case study. To illustrate this concept, information derives from personal interviews, speeches, mass printed media by the movement and the Brazilian government, and theorists who provide a framework that dissects the movement, illustrates its structural-cultural base, and constructs an interpretation in terms of social movement theory. These factors of analysis provide an innovative approach to linking culture analysis with social movement theory, primarily facets of structure and resource mobilization.

This study utilizes the concept of disarticulated accumulation to explore the associations among relations of dominance in the world-economy and human welfare in less developed nations. Disarticulation is cast as the primary intervening factor between dominance and human welfare. / Multiple regression techniques are applied to cross-sectional data in order to test the effects of dominance and disarticulation on human welfare. Additional tests assess the intervening role of disarticulation in the effects of dominance on human welfare. / Both dominance and disarticulation are found to have significant negative effects on human welfare. Disarticulation is found to mediate the effects of dominance on human welfare. This analysis concludes that disarticulation is an important, but overlooked, determinant of human welfare in less developed nations. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 54-02, Section: A, page: 0701. / Major Professor: J. Michael Armer. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1993.

It is generally assumed that educational expansion has positive effects on economic growth. This assumption has been challenged by recent theoretical and empirical sociological studies. It is argued that the effects of education on economic growth are conditioned by broad social conditions in which the relationship between education and economy is embedded. This studies uses two cases, the Meiji Japan (1890-1914) and post WWII Taiwan (1953-1985), to specify the conditions under which promote economic growth. Specifically, this study attempts to answer two related questions: Did the educational expansion actually promote the economic growth in the Meiji Japan and Taiwan (1953-1985)? And if so, under what conditions did the educational expansion promote economic growth? To answer the first question, the Cobb-Douglas production functions are estimated; to answer the second question, historical analyses of state's policy, economic developments and educational expansion in each case are conducted. / The findings and analyses show that education did not have uniform and automatic effects on the remarkable economic growth in these two countries; rather the effects can be understood in terms of how the state, educational and economic systems interact to produce human capital, status competition and class reproduction processes at different levels of education. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 54-02, Section: A, page: 0702. / Major Professor: Jill Quadagno. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1993.

The Confederate veterans represent the only example in American history where a defeated army of rebellion had to rehabilitate and function under the government it previously fought. By the turn of the century, the former Confederate soldiers were beloved members of American society. / The actions that lifted the Confederate veteran from a status of defeated traitor to societal patriarch included organizing, caring for their less fortunate comrades, and convincing their Union counterparts that their loyalty was above question. They emphasized the value of reunification and built monuments to their Confederate heroes without inciting Northern anger. / The culmination of their efforts coincided with changes underway in American society that caused anxiety. The image of blue and gray reunions provided reassurance to Americans, and the public grew to treasure the Civil War veterans. / Confederate veterans played a significant role in changing national attitudes and their success in becoming valued members of society serves as a positive example to any group that feels ostracized from the American social, political, and economic spectrums. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 54-12, Section: A, page: 4568. / Major Professor: Edward F. Keuchel. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1993.

The passage of P.L. 99-457 catapults the issue of parent involvement to the forefront of early childhood special education. Because Part H mandates the establishment of comprehensive services for infants and toddlers with special needs and their families, including the development of an Individual Family Service Plan for each family, but does not specify how family strengths and needs should be addressed, there is a critical need for research exploring the process of parent and professional collaboration at mandated meetings for preschool age children. / Because the study of collaboration is the study of a social process, research methods capable of embracing the phenomenological complexity of the issues must be considered. Information gained through qualitative techniques should assist practitioners in fulfilling the spirit, as well as the letter of the law. / A qualitative study of parent and professional collaboration at mandated meetings for preschool children with special needs was conducted. Twelve initial placement staffings and two special reviews were observed, and indepth, open-ended interviews with sixteen parents and eighteen professionals were conducted. A metaphor of a theatrical play is used to analyze and present the findings. Costumes, set designs, training, characters, interpersonal dynamics, and communication patterns evidenced in the performances are explored. Reviews by participants and a thorough critique by the ethnographer are also presented. A model of the interactive process operating at meetings and the impact of external and internal forces is provided. Results reveal issues not addressed in previous literature. / Special attention is given to presenting those practices found to facilitate and those impeding the collaboration process. Suggestions for improving the collaboration process and implications for practitioners are addressed. Service providers and parents will gain new insights into the process involved at meetings as well as the roles and functions of individual team members. By receiving information gathered through qualitative research methods, practitioners will be better equipped to function in their respective roles at IFSP and IEP meetings. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 53-10, Section: A, page: 3493. / Major Professor: Pearl E. Tait. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1992.

From its inception in 1967, the Kenyan national family planning program has suffered from a lack of popular support and confidence within the general population, absence of active local participation at all levels and, above all, the absence of male participation or neglect of men in the provision of family planning services in a country whose societies are predominantly patriarchal. / The present study uses a conceptual and theoretical framework based on data from the 1989 Kenya Demographic and Health Survey and measures the effects of the male role in family planning activities in Kenya. The study also provides analyses that can be used to identify the conditions under which opportunities for men to participate in family planning programs can be expanded. / The findings indicate that lack of communication between husbands and wives may be a greater obstacle to family planning than male opposition. Couples who discuss the subject of family planning are not only more likely to use contraception, but are also more likely to want to space, postpone or cease childbearing altogether and to use contraception to achieve these fertility goals. Hence, the largest gain in contraceptive use can occur if married couples openly, freely and regularly discuss the subject of family planning. Contraceptive use in Kenya is also a function of (1) residence in regions whose constituent communities adhere less to traditional patterns of reproductive behavior (Nairobi and the Central and Eastern regions), (2) higher levels of education for the husbands, (3) employment in higher status occupations, (4) higher levels of education for the wives, (5) women being in the middle of their reproductive ages, and (6) rural residence. Other factors seem to have little or no significant effect on contraception. / The study concludes that inclusion of male factors in the family planning program is not only crucial for more effective program performance, but is also an area of policy that should be among those consciously considered in the deliberative process of lowering fertility and reducing population growth. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 53-07, Section: A, page: 2572. / Major Professor: Bruce Stiftel. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1992.

The religion of Santeria has been in the news lately. Many Americans have come to know about this secretive religion because of the huge controversy in Hialeah, Florida regarding the right of practitioners to sacrifice animals to their gods. In 1987, Hialeah city officials were opposed to animal sacrifice and expressed a concern for the public health because of the presence of bloody carcasses in the streets and rivers. This thesis will only briefly deal with the topic of animal sacrifice, rather it will focus on a side of the religion that does not attract as much publicity: the initiation. More precisely, the focus will be the expenses accrued by initiates into this religion. / Santeria is a syncretic Afro-Cuban religion that evolved from the mixture of certain African religious rites with European spiritualist and Roman Catholic beliefs. This mixture started in the 16$\sp{\rm th}$ century with the importation of African slaves to the island of Cuba. The slaves were brought to provide the labor for the booming sugar industry on the island. The Spaniards who controlled Cuba forced the African slaves to convert to Christianity, but in preserving their religion and culture under the cloak of Catholicicism the slaves developed Santeria. / Today, Santeria is a growing religion with millions of practitioners spread across Latin America and the United States. This religion transcends the different social and economic boundaries that societies create. Santeria brings many different worshippers together. This thesis will show that practitioners produce relationships and bonds that become a tight network of mutual social and economic support. / Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 34-01, page: 0093. / Major Professor: J. Anthony Paredes. / Thesis (M.A.)--The Florida State University, 1995.

In Mexican urban life of the eighteenth century, the artisan guilds dominated the economy. The guild system controlled production and trades, regulated apprenticeship and entrance into the trades, and meditated between the interests of the guilds and an intrusive state. Beginning in the latter part of that century, however, and continuing on into the latter part of that century, however, and continuing on into the nineteenth century, economic pressures from merchant capitalists and unlicensed petty producers undermined the guilds paramount position in the local economy. While this process is well known (although little understood), nearly unknown is the role played by the craft-cofradias (confraternities) within the artisan community. My dissertation focuses on the inter-relationship between the guilds and the cofradias, the secular and the sacred. It is my belief that whereas the separate interests of the shopowning artisans and their wage-earning journeymen tended to divide along social class lines, especially with the formal abolition of the guild in 1814, the cofradias melded and mediated the different socio-economic interests of their members. Masses, processions and cofradia administration brought craftsmen together, strengthening and consecrating existing bonds, and gave an added dimension to craft membership. The institutions of the guild-cofradias remained the nuclei around which the city's artisans clustered to maintained their secular and spiritual community. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 57-01, Section: A, page: 0412. / Major Professor: Rodney D. Anderson. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1995.

The purpose of this study was to assess the multi-variant area of control and administration of athletic programs as viewed by the faculty. Satisfaction regarding academic environment, locus of control, and financial sources was investigated by both division affiliation (ie., Division I, II, III) and current athletic board service. Also, an examination of perceived knowledge relevant to policy and procedure was conducted across the above variables. / The sample consisted of full-time faculty members' responses from forty-eight institutions equally representing the three divisions as established by the NCAA (ie. Division I, II, & III). Forty faculty members at each institution were systematically selected as well as all current board members at each institution to receive the "Faculty Satisfaction" questionnaire. To compare Division affiliation differences the Kruskal-Wallis One-Way analysis of Variance by Ranks test was used, and, to compare general faculty to the current faculty board members the Wilcoxon-Mann-Whitney Test was used. All tests were conducted with an Alpha level of.01. The general faculty of Division I was found to be significantly less satisfied than general faculty of Division II in the variable 'Policy and Procedures'. Division III general faculty were more satisfied within all dependent variables than either Division II or I (ie. Policy and Procedures, Financial Resources, and Administrative Input). Current board members from Division I were more satisfied with athletic programming at their institutions across all dependent variables than their general faculty. Division II current board members were more satisfied than their faculty counterparts on two dependent variables, while no difference was found on the variable Administrative Input. Division III comparisons illustrate a lack of significant differences for all variables on satisfaction levels. Also, no significant differences were found in satisfaction levels of current board members according to Division affiliation. / The dependent variable Perceived Knowledge produced the following significantly different pairs; Division III faculty as compared to Division II and I faculty, and Division I faculty as compared to Division I current board. Division III faculty and Division I current board, in both instances, were found to have higher levels of perceived knowledge. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 52-10, Section: A, page: 3556. / Major Professor: Charles Imwold. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1991.